


your body told me in a dream

by ships_to_sail



Category: Schitt's Creek
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Banter, First Kiss, Fluff and Angst, Heavy pining, Innuendo, Light Angst, M/M, Pining, Pining Like Ponderosas, Wisdom Teeth, high patrick
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-11
Updated: 2020-02-11
Packaged: 2021-02-28 05:09:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 11,002
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22658341
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ships_to_sail/pseuds/ships_to_sail
Summary: “What, Patrick? Do you need help burying a body?” Even that might not  be worse than the worst thing he’s helped Alexis do.Patrick laughs. “No! God no, David. I just need a ride to my dentist on Friday.”“Oh, that’s all?” It’s not that it’s no hassle to get the family car, but it’s basically no hassle to get the family car. Which Patrick knows, because David can’t help but mention it pretty much any time the subject of cars comes up. The look on Patrick’s face, the way he’s biting on his lower lip, sets off alarm bells in David’s gut. “That’s not all?”“No, I mean. It is. Only. I’m getting my wisdom teeth out."
Relationships: Patrick Brewer/David Rose
Comments: 24
Kudos: 319





	your body told me in a dream

**Author's Note:**

> For Tori and Margaux, both of whom deserve it, and one of whom helped to make it what it is.
> 
> I figured we could all take High Patrick out for one more spin before we move on to Jake the Himbo Queen.

David Rose loves a party, hates a birthday. It’s one of the foundational contradictions of his life, and one of the many perks of adulthood is that he finally gets to choose what he wants to do on his birthday — which frequently involves pharmaceuticals, romcoms, and a long nap.

David’s 36th birthday is grey, and overcast, and as he walks back from the cafe. the whole world is wrapped in a diffused light and an almost preternatural stillness. Everything feels like it’s perched on the starting block, like time itself waiting for the starting pistol to snap before it takes off at a breakneck pace. Or, maybe that’s just David.

He went from an idea to a vague plan to a general, but specific, plan, to an employee he’d never intended and never prepared for. He still couldn’t think of the way Patrick had said, “Oh, I’m going to get the money,” without something liquid and viscous pooling in his stomach, like a lower back full of honey. It’s the closest he’s come in his new life to doing MDMA, and while he’s left his life of illegal drugs mostly behind him, he has a feeling this Patrick person isn’t going anywhere any time soon. He has to remind himself daily for  _ weeks  _ not to chase the feeling, not to say or do anything he can to get Patrick to look at him like that again. 

And now they’re open; David is officially a small business owner, following more in the footsteps of his father than he ever would’ve predicted, and while it’s not all Patrick’s fault, it’s more Patrick’s doing than David had seen coming. The more time passes, the more he doesn’t know if it’s possible to see someone like Patrick coming, or if something in the very nature of Patrick means he’ll forever be a surprise. In less than thirty days Patrick Brewer manages to enter his life and upend the last three three decades of his existence. 

David slips into the store, caramel macchiato in one hand, green tea in the other, and leaves Patrick’s cup on the counter. Patrick is in the bathroom, which is perfect because it gives David the chance to breeze straight to the back room to hide. His birthdays always have him on edge, defenses down and all his softest parts too easily accessible. He’s learned the hard way that he needs to give his brain breathing room from Patrick when he feels like this, or he’s going to end up doing something he'll most definitely regret.

He sets about counting boxes and marking them off on a sticky note he always keeps nearby. It’s the most professional system he’s managed to stick with so far, and Patrick only gives him shit about it every other day at this point. 

“Hey, stranger,” Patrick says, leaning up against the doorway in a long diagonal that draws David eyes like a Sargent portrait. He’s backlit by the bright grey light pouring through the front room and for a second, David is reminded of Peter Pan’s shadow, the part of the boy who never grows up that can’t stop running away. “How was the café?”

“Mm, busy,” David says, his eyes recounting the same six boxes over and over again so he doesn’t have to look at the aggressively fond glow of Patrick’s face. He keeps the word short, telegraphing with every fiber of his body that he’s not up for their normal routine that morning.

Sometimes, Patrick is so overwhelmingly friendly that David doesn’t know what to do about it, the same instincts that had let Alexis wrap a cat-hair scarf around his alarmingly allergic face causing him to clap David on the shoulder, or wrap him in a friendly hug when they end their first official day as co-business owners. He's hoping if he just doesn't look at Patrick, doesn't keep up his end of the small talk, maybe Patrick will go away. Today, of all days, he needs a break from the spinning in his head, before he gets so dizzy a little piece of truth falls out. 

Unfortunately, the universe isn't on his side today.

"You know, your sister stopped by this morning," Patrick says casually. Too casually. David freezes, ice water dripping down his spine as he runs through the rolodex of embarrassing things Alexis could have said in his absence. Patrick is picking at a patch of paint on the other side of the doorframe; David can see the little flecks of dark paint sticking to his fingertips. 

"Well, isn't she the early bird."

"She said something about needing to pick up a few things before her graduation tonight." His face is a collection of straight lines and sincere tones. He runs a hand across his mouth and it makes David want to scream, or punch something, or shove his mouth over Patrick’s and lick along the line his hand had just traced. He breathes through his nose and tries to countdown from thirty, wonders if it's already too soon to take his lunch break. Patrick’s voice is playful, bouncing between the syllables. He’s staring straight at David, shifting his weight back and forth between his heels and the balls of his feet. He’s practically vibrating, and David knows they haven’t been open long enough that day to make a sale worthy of that reaction. 

“She also mentioned something about you not  _ going  _ to her graduation because it's your birthday?" 

David hears the word  _ birthday _ , and every muscle in his body freezes. “I hope you reminded her that friends and family discount ended on opening day.”

“Of course I did.” David waits, drawing out the silence until the other shoe drops with a gentle thud. “She talked me up to 30% and a free tote bag, but in my defense she’s a surprisingly good negotiator.”

“Well, she's practiced on some of the world's most terrifying war criminals, so,” he quips, but there’s a smile at the corner of his mouth and he lets the discount go. He really can’t blame Patrick, when faced with the full force of Alexis haggling. 

“Why didn’t you tell me it was your birthday, David?” Patrick’s face is still that open, hopeful face it always is, but there’s a tightness around his eyes that David doesn’t want to think too hard about. 

“It’s not important.”

“Oh, I don’t know about that,” Patrick shakes his head a little, tucking a hand into his pocket. “They only happen once a year, you know.”

“I hadn’t realized,” David deadpans, forcing his attention to the next pile of boxes in need of incessant counting. 

“Would you, I mean – I'd like to take you out for your birthday, if you don't already have plans? ” 

David didn’t think it was possible for the muscles in his face to fall so fast. He’s surprised he doesn’t injure something. “You really don’t have to do that.”

“No. But I want to. Come on, it’ll be fun.” 

David turns and looks at him, and he’s somehow managed to turn the volume on his eyes up to eleven, so. What else is David supposed to say but, “okay” and “sure” and “8:00 sounds perfect.” Even if he does still hate birthdays. 

*

Patrick shows up in a sport coat, which is adorably overdressed for the soggy mozzarella sticks they end up splitting while David explains that he’d invited Stevie, too, but she’d ended up with a car that wouldn’t start and two spare bottles of wine at home.

“Ah, that’s too bad,” Patrick says, but he doesn’t actually sound all that broken up about it. Which is weird, because Patrick and Stevie love spending time together, but for all David knows they’ve gotten into some kind of tiff over...whatever it was they talked about when they weren’t talking about David.

“Oh, hey,” Patrick says as they’re walking back to his car, David overly full on the chocolate milkshake he’d insisted on ordering. “I got you this.” Patrick holds out a bag David had noticed earlier — of  _ course  _ he’d noticed, what kind of hopelessly dorky heterosexual man dresses to match a gift bag — but had mustered up the common civility not to ask about. “But you don’t have to open it now.”

“Oh. Um. Okay.” David takes the bag with the tips of his fingers, opening it and peering inside to see nothing but several tufts of tissue paper.

“It’s nothing,” Patrick says, blushing as he fumbles with his keys. He unlocks the car and David hears the metallic ‘swish’ of the mechanism. He pulls the door open and slides inside so he doesn’t have to spend the rest of his night erasing the slow creep of pink across Patrick’s ears from his mind. He sets his gift on the floor of the car between his feet and fastens his seatbelt.

“Well, without knowing what it is — thank you. This is the first gift I haven’t bought for myself in a very long time.”

“Happy birthday, David,” Patrick says for like the fifth time that night, looking at him fondly before putting his car in reverse and beginning the drive back to the motel. It’s not a long drive, but it’s enough time for David to fidget in his seat, first tucking his hands under his thighs, and then pulling them out so he can pick at his nails and tug the sleeves of his sweaters down over his thumbs. He has no idea why he’s acting like he’s on speed, but he blames the deep, woodsy scent of Patrick’s deodorant and the way he slips from a falsetto to a gravelly, scrapey thing when he sings along with the songs on the radio. It’s not fair, really. It’s a multifaceted assault on David’s senses that have left him feeling raw and overstimulated. 

He’s relieved when Patrick finally stops the car, one less source of sensory input to focus on. Instead, Patrick’s hands come to rest on the steering wheel, and he’s staring straight ahead at David’s door like he’s expecting it to open and launch something at them. David stares with him, spinning the silver rings on his fingers. He watches the line of Patrick’s throat as he swallows, twice, in quick succession. Patrick’s nostrils flare on the exhale and his fingers seem clamped around the steering wheel.

“Thank you, again, for a lovely dinner Patrick.”

“You’re welcome, David.. You deserve a nice birthday.” 

David shifts a little in his seat, daring a glance at Patrick, who isn’t staring at the door anymore, but is looking at David’s profile like he’s never seen the side of another human’s face. David’s getting that feeling he only ever gets with Patrick, that he’s under a microscope, some ancient manuscript whose secrets are written in layers and layers on top of each other, a history of stories blurring into one another. It makes David itch, makes the blood pool just underneath his skin so that he feels warm to the touch. Every time Patrick looks at him like that, he wants to dip his chin down and taste Patrick’s mouth like candy, wants to lick into the back of his throat and press his lips into Patrick’s until he feels teeth. 

Which wouldn’t be a problem, if they didn’t work together. If David’s identity weren’t now wrapped up in Rose Apothecary, and in the grant money that helped get it off the ground. If Patrick wasn’t straight. Hopelessly, inconvertably straight. David had danced that danced one too many times, frequently by accident and far less regularly on purpose, and he didn’t — couldn’t — go back to being the kind of person who ripped himself open like that. He couldn’t do that to himself, couldn’t put Patrick in that position, and he’s beyond pissed that no one ever told him that becoming a better person could  _ suck  _ so damn much.

“Well. I’m gonna...,” he says, popping open the door and scooping up the gift bag at his feet. He slips a leg outside and shivers at the warm night air, a stark contrast to the blast of air conditioner in Patrick’s car. He loops his hand through the handle above the window and is shifting to stand when Patrick...says something? Makes a noise? To this day, David isn’t sure, but he’s got David’s attention and he’s opening and closing his mouth like a fish. There’s a small, dark, shard of something in his normally soft brown eyes, and David’s breath catches in his chest. Patrick’s leaning over the center console, just enough that he’s over the center line and in David’s space. 

He’s got his eyes tracking David’s lips like he’s starving, and something in David’s stomach crumples when Patrick’s tongue darts out and licks his lips. David knows that look, but that’s impossible, because that look can’t possibly be on Patrick’s face right now. David sinks back into his seat, his grip slack, as he waits, and he wants, and he wills the universe to give him a break one fucking time. But whatever magic makes fairy tale moments happen skips this moment, and after a beat Patrick clears his throat and looks down at the radio and slides a warm smile back onto his face. “Goodnight, David. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

There’s a magnet pull behind David’s ribcage and his diaphragm doesn’t seem to be working because he can’t get a proper breath into his lungs and he thinks maybe he’s going to pass out. But he can’t pass out in Patrick’s car, because that would be embarrassing and unprofessional and  _ incorrect  _ and he can’t be any of those things. Not right now, not in this moment. So, with a strength he doesn’t understand, he nods and smiles a smile he thinks looks mostly real. 

“Tomorrow, mmhmm. See you then.” And he stands, and closes the door, and ignores the way the slam echoes in his bones like the bass line to a song he can’t remember. 

He waits until Alexis is in the shower, so he can have the closest thing he gets to privacy anymore, before he sets Patrick's gift on the bed and just stares at it, like it’s a wild animal. He wants to open it, but he’s terrified. David understands the power of the proper gift, and he knows it doesn’t _really_ matter what’s in the bag, the kindness is in the giving. But he also doesn’t want it to be something he has to pretend to love. He pulls out the heavy, square object from the mass of tissue paper, his heart is in his throat. Which is good, because it keeps him from choking on the mass of tears that spring to his eyes when he finally processes what he’s seeing behind the glass.

Seventeen dollars. Two chapsticks and an epsom salt bath soak. The first things they’d ever sold at the store, the first transaction that meant maybe David’s dream could survive, could take flight, could become something more than the nothing he’d originally conceived of in this very room, exhausted from his shifts at the Blouse Barn and wondering if the rest of his life were going to be painted in tacky polyester and a sea of beige. Before Wendy decided to move on. Before he got drunk and confessed to Stevie he had an idea, a crazy idea, for something that might just be his. Before a little button of a man walked into his life and told him that his idea not only  _ wasn’t  _ crazy, but was good. So much of what they’d made was energetically Patrick, even if it was stylistically David, and for a second he wonders if Patrick kept a copy of this first receipt for himself. Has his own reminder of this thing they’re building, this thing that’s there’s, at home on his own wall. 

The thin sheet of carbon paper was time stamped and had the ghostly imprint of a signature, but in the corner, just the smallest stretch of the small scrap, is a dark whorl. The leftover of a fingerprint, somehow inked and transferred to this memento of something unique to him and Patrick. Now that he’s seen it, he can’t unsee it, and he spends the rest of the night sitting and stroking the glass, thinking of Patrick and the way his hands must have looked, folded warm and protective over the receipt from their first sale, tucking it safely behind the glass and giving it to David as a sign. As a sign that he’s glad he’s here, glad he’s working with David, glad they have the business between them.

*

David crosses the street from the cafe with twins cups of tea, which Patrick has somehow convinced him to switch to after lunch. It took two years and about a million different blends before David found one that he enjoys as much as his ridiculous coffee order. And he  _ does  _ sleep better now. Not that he’d ever tell Patrick that. 

As David approaches the store, he can see Patrick through the window, and his feet slow down. He drifts towards the corner of the brick facade, pressing himself up against the building and taking the moment to watch his business partner, conducting business. He’s got his back to David, a bottle of skin toner in each hand. He can see from here that one is the cucumber witch-hazel, and the other is the apricot tea tree blend, both of which are new enough that they’re still learning the ingredient list, and which of their already-stocked products the lines work best with it. Even with his hands full, Patrick is able to point his fingers and sweep his hands over the table full of product, conducting a silent orchestra of salesmanship. 

David can’t see the customer’s face, but he doesn’t need to. He knows what the human body does when exposed to the Patrick Brewer treatment — he’s been moving through the world high on it for two years. He can feel it from outside, the way Patrick’s eyes form this kind of blanket of pressure, this slow caress that makes it feel like he’s taking you apart at the atoms, classifying and categorizing and putting you back together in his own new taxonomy. Patrick Brewer rearranges the classification systems of the universe, the ones that tell David he’s silly and hysterical and probably wasn’t ready for this life path he’s chosen for himself. Patrick looks at him — looks at everybody — like there’s an entire universe of optimistic choice laid out for the choosing, like he’s just waiting for David to make the best, better, choice. 

He’s running his thumb around the lip of his cup, watching the way the grey, cold light throws shadows across Patrick’s face, when, before he can duck behind the building, that same face is trained on his like Patrick has some kind of David GPS installed. Their eyes meet through the window, and after a brief fold of eyebrows downward and tiny smile, Patrick’s eyes are back on the customer as he puts back the cucumber toner, turning his back on the window and walking to the register. David’s breath is rushing in and out of his chest so loudly it sounds like he’s in a wind tunnel; there’s a ringing in his ears that he can’t push past, and it feels a little like he stood up too fast. All completely normal ways to be feeling after making a brief second of eye contact with your business partner while hiding in the alley outside the store you own.

He walks purposefully through the front door like he hadn’t just taken infinitely longer than was necessary to get his tea (which, of course, Patrick would notice because that was exactly the category of thing Patrick noticed without trying, like holidays and overtime pay and the lyrics to bad pop songs). He shuffles into the back room, making something that’s supposed to be a  _ hello _ noise as he passes Patrick as quickly as he can, refusing to make eye contact even though he can feel Patrick’s eyes burning into the arch of his cheekbone. 

David hears the bell on the door, and Patrick appears in the back room. He hops up onto the work table, his solid thighs splaying out just so, his hips not quite narrow enough to fit in the space, knocking over a couple of new tester bottles in the process. He grimaces and holds up his hands like he's warding off trouble. “How was the café?"

“Mmm, busy,” David says noncommittally, fully aware that Patrick had seen him skulking around outside. 

“Busy? Before lunch on a Tuesday?” Patrick’s voice makes it very clear exactly how much he believes David.

“A madhouse,” he doubles down. “It’s lucky I made it out alive.”

“I’m very, very glad you managed to survive, David.” Patrick has both arms crossed over his chest, and he’s bobbing his head with every word, the vein in his neck standing out in bas relief against his pale skin. His voice is low and sincere and it sends a shiver down David’s spine. “I'm just shocked you managed to keep the tea warm, what with all the trawling around in front of the store.” There it is. Patricks near-invisible eyebrows are lost in his hairline, and he’s smirking at David like he’s just won a carnival prize.

“I wasn’t trawling,” David insists. “I don’t even know if that’s a real word.”

“Oh, we’re not really going to have the ‘real word’ conversation again, are we?”

“You can’t play proper nouns in Scrabble!” David screeches, always ready to have a fight over the adherence to proper board game rules. 

“Don’t be mad at me because I finally beat you. It took a year and a half, I think your record is safe.” Patrick laughs and slides off the table, leaning against the edge and shoving his hands deep in his pockets, which he does whenever he’s about to say something important, or he’s nervous, or he’s just looking at David so fondly that David still, after two years, has to fight the urge to look for an emergency exit. “So, I was wondering. What might one have to do to get one of those famous David Rose favors?" He bats his eyelashes at David like a Disney princess.

They’ve been working together long enough that David has mostly trained himself to maintain a steady neutrality while in Patrick’s general presence, and Patrick has been used to dealing with David from the moment they met. He still delights in pushing David’s buttons, and after two years his delight still seems to increase every time he finds a new short nerve, a new place where David’s inability to compromise is simply  _ incorrect _ . 

But all of David’s practice goes to absolute shit when he’s under caffeinated and so wrapped up in thoughts of the way Patrick looks with a Scrabble tile pinched between his teeth, brows furrowed in concentration. And David’s not sure there will ever come a time when he’s completely Patrick-proof. Every now and then, his defenses slip, and Patrick says something so innocuous that his brain immediately makes so filthy, he whites-out. Like asking David for a favor like he's asking for a ticket to the chocolate factory.. 

“Oh, um,” David licks his suddenly desert dry lips and wonders why the heat in the store is up so high. Patrick’s eyes immediately fall to David’s lips, and David feels like a touch. He gets so distracted leaning into Patrick's imaginary caress and trying not to remember old trainings at Rose Video, he let's an awkward amount of time go by before he awkwardly follows up with, “What kind of favor?”

Patrick rocks back and forth on his heels, running a hand across the back of his neck, a gesture when he does when he’s asking for his third type of favor, a favor he knows he’ll get a yes to but that he feels impolite asking for because he can’t repay immediately. Patrick has five Favor Types and David knows them all, because knowing Patrick and running Rose Apothecary are apparently the only two things he’s got a real aptitude for anymore. 

“What, Patrick? Do you need help burying a body?” Even that might not be worse than the worst thing he’s helped Alexis do.

Patrick laughs. “No! God no, David. I just need a ride to my dentist on Friday.”

“Oh, that’s all?” It’s not that it’s  _ no  _ hassle to get the family car, but it’s basically no hassle to get the family car. Which Patrick knows, because David can’t help but mention it pretty much any time the subject of cars comes up. The look on Patrick’s face, the way he’s biting on his lower lip, sets off alarm bells in David’s gut. “That’s not all?”

“No, I mean. It is. Only. I’m getting my wisdom teeth out. Which they have to put me under for, which means I won’t exactly be able to get myself home.”

“Uh-huh.” 

“And I’m...not supposed to stay alone. For the first, like, day basically. I guess in case I fall out of bed and land on my face and choke on the stitches or something.” He laughs, but it’s hollow, and the picture of exactly that, Patrick on the floor of his apartment bloody and in pain and helpless makes David’s chest fold inwards, going concave with a depth of ache that steals the breath from his lungs. 

“I’ll do it,” he says quickly, quietly, with a decisive nod of his head. 

“David, that was a joke, I’m sure I’ll be fine.”

“Sure, and you got your medical degree where, exactly?”

Patrick blushes and holds up his hands in surrender. His palms look soft, and David refuses to think about just  _ how  _ soft. “Fair enough. I just. I know it’s a big ask — I’ll probably be asleep, most of the day, and who knows how I’ll be after the anesthetic...”

“Patrick, it’s fine. We’d basically be spending the day together anyway.”

“Well, yeah, but I think doing inventory is a little different than wiping drool off my face, and trying to keep me from running naked down the street.” Patrick blushes and shrugs. “Or whatever crazy thing it is I decided to do stoned off my ass.”

David tries harder than he’s ever tried at anything in his life not to conjure the image of a naked Patrick. “I wouldn’t. Um. I mean, that would be — it’s fine, Patrick. It’s nothing.”

“It’s not nothing,” Patrick says quickly, his eyes bright. “You’re sure you don’t mind?”

David’s smile is sincere. He nods as he says, “Friday. To the dentist and home, tucked safe into bed.” The words are out before his brain can register them and he presses his lips into a straight line and plucks an invisible piece of lint of the sweater he’s folding. “Which is a thing I just said to you. So.”

Patrick’s laugh is a bell, a chime, the final chord on the outro of a favorite song. David feels something akin to anger at just how much he enjoys the sound, and at just how freely Patrick is able to give it away. “Friday, David. It’s a date. A dental date.”

And David is a completely rational, sane person, who absolutely doesn’t spend the rest of the day thinking the phrase “dental date” and the thousands of different ways he can say it in his head, like a song. 

*

The drive to Patrick’s dentist is easy, and relatively quick, minus the part where they’re up a solid two hours before David would prefer to be. Alexis is in their room, slamming bathroom drawers and rattling cosmetic products together obnoxiously, because she’s pissed she agreed to cover the store for him. But there’d been an entire month’s worth of the good face masks in it for her, and David had told her like three times when she’d have to get up to open the store, so it’s not his fault. That doesn’t change the fact that she’s whirling through their shared space like a tornado and making pointed little coughing sounds every time she passes his bed.

After that, the drive to Elmdale is a piece of cake. He and Patrick cycle through the radio stations until they land on something playing a generic top forty, and it’s easy to eat up the time debating the top ten ranking, reminiscing about their favorite bad pop songs, designing a new playlist for the upcoming season at the store.

“You can’t put two Kacey Musgraves songs back to back,” David says as they pull off the highway and onto the main boulevard that will take them where they need to go.

“Why not? You put two Whitney Houston songs together like four songs ago.”

“First of all, and no shade to Kacey—she’s lovely — don’t you ever put her and Whitney’s name into your mouth at the same time. Secondly, that wasn’t two Whitney songs. It was a Whitney song and a Whitney cover of a Dolly song, so.”

“No shade? What, are the teen hoodlums back and teaching you slang again?”

“Okay, aren’t you supposed to be, like, resting your jaw or something?”

"Why would I need to rest my jaw, David?"

"I don't think I'm allowed to answer that question, as your employer." It's easier, in the car, to say these kinds of things, when he doesn't have to watch Patrick's cheeks color like a Georgia peach.

"And what would you say if you weren't my  _ coworker _ ," Patrick says the last word pointedly. His eyebrows slant downward and his eyes take up half of his face and it's a good thing they're almost there because David is dangerously close to driving them off the road.

"That your social life is your business," David shoots back, and takes momentary joy in hearing Patrick sputter for once. But then he smiles at David, and it's a sharp, wicked thing that David's glad he doesn't have to look at head-on.

"I guess it's lucky for my jaw that your business is my social life, then, huh?"

David makes what Alexis calls his distressed ostrich noise and Patrick breaks, laughing so loudly and for so long they're pulling into the parking lot by the time he gets his breath back under control. Two years and Patrick's title of Innuendo King is in no danger of going anywhere. 

David turns off the engine and feels a pang of sadness that the drive wasn’t longer, immediately wonders what excuse he can use to take another lap around the block. The door clicks open when Patrick lets out a quick, “Hey.”

“Hmm?”

“Thank you. For doing this. Just in case I’m too messed up afterwards to say it. Thank you for bringing me.”

“Nothing else I’d rather do.” He falls miles short of sarcastic, and he knows Patrick hears it, but he doesn’t mind it, because it’s true.

He lets Patrick lead the way out of the car and up into the generic brick building, one of several in the little office complex. David noted a sign for a nail salon and an optometrist office on this side of the street, and a chain sandwich shop across the road, which he considers as a last lunch resort, if all of this ends up taking longer than Patrick thinks it will. Which, of course, it doesn’t, because that’s the way life works for Patrick. David hits every red light on the drive and Patrick gets his wisdom teeth out a full forty-five minutes before they’re forecasted to be done. David’s barely gotten to the best part of the 2011 Marie Claire he’s just grabbed off the table, Cameron Diaz’s beautiful blonde bob beckoning, when the nurse is calling out for a Mr. Rose, Patrick tucked up in a wheelchair in front of him. 

“Is that necessary?” David says, very quickly realizing that getting the wheelchair in the car is a level of tetris he’s not prepared to play. 

“Not past the front door,” the nurse says kindly, pushing Patrick towards the exit as David falls in step beside him. "He had a bit of a time waking up today, he might be a bit out of it for a little while. You spoke to the discharge nurse about care instructions?"

"Mmhmm, yep," David says, patting his back pocket, where he's got a folded up stack of papers full of warnings about fever and dry socket and disorientation. For someone who panics easily, he feels like he's breathing through it all rather well.

Which gets a lot harder to do when Patrick looks up at him, his warm brown eyes a whiskey-colored cask of comfort, and says, "Prince David?" In a hushed, reverent tone. David's eyes go wide and he chokes on his own saliva as the nurse just laughs. 

"Yeah, he's been calling everyone that since we woke up. Tried to knight the anesthesiologist when he came by on his rounds, kept telling everyone he was questing for the Holy Grail."

"Ha," David gets halfway through a laugh and gives up. He can absolutely imagine Patrick, freshly awake and high off his ass, playing medieval prince and spreading his royal cheer far and wide. But, high or not, joke or not, David can also imagine signing over every last dime in his bank account, every stitch of knitwear, ever share of ownership in Rose Apothecary just to have Patrick look at him like he's the freshly risen sun and call him a prince one more time.

"David, I'm hungry." Patrick is slapping the ends of his sweatshirt hood ties together and making little lightsaber noises and David wants to wrap him up in a fluffy comforter and tuck him into his little bed at the same time that he wants to lay him down and worship him and  _ ohhh fuck.  _ It's possible this whole thing is a very, very bad idea. But what's he going to do now? Bolt and leave his business partner drugged and stranded? Wouldn't that make for an awkward Monday.

"Let's get you home, buddy," David says, and he's not sure where the 'buddy' came from, but he hopes it returns there post-haste and doesn't come back, like. Ever. 

"You sure you got this?" The nurse asks, a sudden note of trepidation in his voice that wasn't there before. David nods his head vigorously and smiles as convincingly as he can.

"Absolutely. Let me just get the car?" he motions over his shoulder towards the parking lot and the nurse nods. 

"We'll meet you at the car."

David has to slide the drivers seat back by several adorable inches, and he fiddles with the radio while the nurse helps Patrick navigate his jellied limbs into the passenger's seat.

"You're so nice," Patrick says for the tenth time in sixty seconds. He's practically chanting it, slurring the end of one sentence into the start of the next one and his mouth is making shapes David's never seen before. They're sliding against one another, and his tongue, and the edges of his teeth, in a way that adds a calming susurration to his voice. 

There are lots of reasons David thinks Patrick should get high more often, but the way it sands all the edges off his voice until it's something silky and tangible is very quickly jumping to the top of the list

David pulls out of the parking lot, and it feels momentous, somehow. Like it used to feel picking Alexis up from the airport in the dead of night. He'd watch her sleep in the flickering light of the amber highway lights as they sped towards home and he'd feel the weighty task of keeping her safe. Patrick isn't asleep, but he's folded into himself, his warm grey hoodie bunched around his sternum, white t-shirt climbing off his lower back as he pulls his knees to his chest and begins to run a finger over his kneecap in a way that makes David hurt with a specific kind of longing.

Oh, to be a kneecap. 

"Knees are weird," Patrick says quietly.

"They are," David agrees, because he's always thought it was more fun to 'yes, and' the inebriated. 

"You're weird," Patrick says, and before David can let every cruel voice that's ever lived in his head grab that one and run away with it, Patrick keeps talking. "A cool weird. I think I'm a not cool weird." He's got cotton stuffed in his mouth, which makes everything sound a little soft, but David's a good listener. He can hear the shred of softness that has nothing to do with cotton wads and anaesthetics and it cuts at him like the world's smallest knife, invisible cuts he won't feel until later, when he's alone and can't help pawing at them until they bleed.

"You're a cool weird," he says into the space Patrick left.

Patrick's face turns towards him and he's beaming. "Hey David?" 

"Yes?"

"I'm hungry. I'm a hungry hungry hippooooo," he croons, his voice cracking like he's a teenager and it makes David go so soft, he scrunches his eyes together and bounces in his seat a bit. Just for a second, because he knows Patrick won’t be able to remember long enough to tease him for it later. "Will you feed me?" David almost swallows his tongue and he hope Patrick doesn't notice the tiny swerve of the car. 

"Why don't you try resting," he says, his voice scratching as he forces it out of the back of his throat. "We'll be back to your place soon, and then we can talk food."

"Okay," Patrick says cheerily. "But don't forget. Okay?"

"Never," David promises, and Patrick nods his head, once, but a little harder than he means to, so that his neck bends and he bangs his forehead into the window. Not too hard, but hard enough that David throws a hand onto his chest on instinct, his hissed " _ fuck _ " coming out harsh and sharp.

"Ouch," Patrick says, pouty. He rubs his hand against the red spot on his forehead and then grabs David's wrist, pressing the pads of his fingers against his forehead. "I gotta bump." He's frowning and there's a little sheen to his eyes but all David can think about is all the times he wanted to touch this exact spot, wanted to press the grains of his fingerprints into the grooves of Patrick's forehead until the skin smooths and David feels like he's served a purpose, making Patrick feel better.

"You think you'll survive?" David teases, and Patrick just scoffs, but he doesn't let go of David's hand, drawing his fingers in a slow circle on his forehead. Patrick leans into the pressure and David's entire world shrinks to those two points, a combined centimeter of skin where his body presses into Patrick's.

"Kiss it better." And Patrick is high out of his mind. Has to be, to be asking his business partner and walking pansexual disaster to kiss his forehead. Plus, there's a pout in his voice and on his infuriating mouth so he probably thinks David is his mom or something, even if he doesn't really think Patrick would ever stare down his mom the way he's doing to David.

David doesn't say anything, just makes a strangled little noise, and tries to focus on not running them off the road as he drops his hand to the gear shift. Patrick leans forward, like he's trying to follow David's hand, and his voice is so gravely when he speaks David's worried he might actually be hurting his throat.

"David, I have a secret to tell you."

David is looking at the road, has to keep looking at the road, doesn't want to kill either of them before Patrick says whatever secret's climbed into his drug-addled brain. But also he can't breathe and his heart isn't beating and his hand is wrapped around the steering wheel so tightly his knuckles ache. He doesn’t say anything, terrified that if he does Patrick will lose the thread, won’t follow through on whatever it is that he’s decided now is the time to say. So David sits in a silence that pulls on him like a livewire, that stretches his patience and slams on all his nerves at the same time.

Out of the corner of his eye, he watches Patrick’s lips work sound into meaning. “I’m very hungry.”

The groan David lets out could shatter glass, and the noise shocks a honking laugh out of Patrick, who falls back into the seat and wraps his arms around his stomach. And because he's Patrick, he gets distracted enough by the clouds outside the windows that he’s mercifully mostly silent the rest of the way home. 

*

He props Patrick in the doorway, and manages to get his key in the lock before Patrick begins to tilt, leaning aggressively into David’s shoulder, who even with his extra height bows under the sudden increase in weight. David catches him, and a little whine escapes Patrick’s mouth, high-pitched and precious. David looks down at him and smiles.

“You’re warm,” Patrick says, his head falling heavily onto David’s shoulder. David rolls his eyes and somehow, through a feat of strength and flexibility he wouldn’t have thought possible, he gets the deadbolt thrown and Patrick inside the apartment. He staggers him to the nearest chair and gets Patrick into the seat, although he’s practically bent in half. 

“David—” 

“I swear to God if you tell me you are hungry one more time I will jump out that window.”

Patricks jaw snap shuts and David feels bad for a split second, until Patrick looks at him with the eyes of a Labrador and stage whispers, “...but I  _ am  _ hungry. Do we have mozzarella sticks?!” He’s so excited at the thought that he tries to stand, which ends with him vertical for the blink of an eye before he’s rocketing towards the surprisingly lovely hardwood floors, face first. 

David lunges for him, and manages to catch him in time, but just barely. His hands press into Patrick’s chest as he pushes him back into the chair, panting with the sudden exertion. He pushes a little harder than he needs to once Patrick is seated, hoping Patrick gets the fucking picture and doesn’t try to do that again.

“Your hands are like. Really big. Look at them.” Patrick places his hands over David's, pressing David's hands into the planes of Patrick's chest. He lines up the back of their wrists and drums his fingers against the back of David's where they're not quite as long. He's got David's hands trapped, and it forces David to stay or risk pulling Patrick back out of the chair. 

“Yeah, well. Genetics,” he says, and his voice comes out choked in a way he can’t explain. It’s too quiet in Patrick’s apartment, and it’s making his voice sound too loud in his ears, so he drops his voice when he says. “Can I have my hands back now, please?”

“Absolutely! David,” his voice is just as low, tinged with a bit of frantic panic that’s new. “I would  _ never  _ want to take your hands away from you. Do you know how important hands are?” He grabs David’s hand and drops it into his lap, pawing at his with his fingers like he’s never seen a human hand before.

David doesn’t move a muscle, frozen at the heavy, soothing drum of Patrick’s fingertips against his palm. He lets his eyes drift closed, just for a second, and lets his heart beat along with the erratic rhythm Patrick’s creating. When he stops, David’s eyes fly open and Patrick’s face is so close to his he can see the hint of white cotton peeking out from behind his molars, a flash of white against a shade of pink he doesn’t dare call rose. 

“David, how are you  _ sooo _ handsome?” Patrick’s eyes are all over his face, and David has to fight the urge to bring his hands over his own face to keep Patrick from being able to see what’s written there in neon letters ten feet tall. David’s face has always given him away, and Patrick has learned to read him better than anyone else.

“Well aren’t  _ you  _ just the sweetest little stoner,” he says, his voice barely above a whisper. “But all the flirting in the world won’t get you fed for another four hours.” He pats Patrick twice on the knee and forces himself to stand. 

“‘S not flirting if it’s true,” Patrick says, a haughtiness in his voice like he’s really gotten the rhetorical upper hand. And apparently the floors in Patrick’s apartment aren’t as nice as they look because they’re rolling underneath David’s feet.

“Okay, let’s get you into bed, Cassanova.” He needs to get Patrick in bed so he can get the fuck out of this apartment and get a breath of Patrick-free air. Maybe that will get his head to stop spinning, cold shivers sweeping over his body every time he realizes he’s going to have to touch Patrick. Again. 

He slips an arm under Patrick’s shoulder, and maybe it’s because Patrick is more used to navigating with David now, but the trip from the armchair to the bed is the easiest yet. He manages to somewhat gracefully toss Patrick onto the mattress, who lands with one arm still around David’s shoulder, so David is pulled down too. 

“I want mozzarella sticks,” Patrick whines, his voice needling. David bristles — he’s never met someone as obsessed with food as stoned Patrick Brewer, and he looks in the mirror every single day. 

“Four hours and they’re all yours.” He pulls down the zipper on Patricks hoodie, slipping it off his shoulders and folding it loosely before setting it on the top of the dresser. 

“Promise? They’re in the  _ freezer _ ,” he says in a conspiratorial whisper. “From  _ Twyla _ .”

“You made Twyla give you frozen fried cheese?”

He nods, and his head rolls a bit. “Yep.” He pops the ‘p’ and the way his lips move over his teeth should be a sin. Or a sacrament. “Store was sold out.”

He reaches behind Patrick to grab a pillow, forming a little stack in the middle of his bed. “And mozzarella sticks are just that key to a bachelor diet, hmmm?” He’s humoring him, but the longer Patrick is talking about mozzarella sticks, the less time he has to keep playing Jenga with the pieces of David’s heart.

Patrick makes a little “pft” sound with his mouth, like he’s never heard anything so outrageous. Which, given the track of their entire conversation, doesn’t seem entirely fair to David. “Noooo. I got them to remember our  _ date _ .”

David’s pretty sure he’s sitting down, but to be entirely honest he can’t really feel his limbs anymore. “Patrick, what are you talking about?” His entire body is one taught muscle, his lips barely moving as he forms the question. 

“Our date! For your birthdaaaay! Those mozzarella sticks were  _ bad _ . But the date was good,” he nods solemnly. “Until I didn’t kiss you. That was bad.  _ Incorrect.”  _ He kind of puffs up his chest and waves his hand near his temple when he says the last one, a little giggle as he cracks himself up. It’s an awful impression of David, but David can’t muster so much as a single witty retort. 

He’s running Patrick’s words through his hands like Adelina used to sift through dry rice, looking for bits of husk and stone. Because Patrick is high, but Patrick isn’t hallucinating and Patrick isn’t a liar, and if David has spent the last years of his life inches away from what he wants, thinking it was miles, he’s not sure his heart is going to be able to take it.

“Patrick, that wasn’t a date. We didn’t, I mean you wouldn’t, we wouldn’t — I would have known if it was a date.”

Patrick lurches forward and grabs David’s face with his hands. They’re warm, and heavy, and kind of pinching David’s cheeks together. His eyes are dark, and serious, and he’s looking at David like a prize. “David. I’m sorry! I didn’t tell you. But it was  _ absolutely  _ a date.” He taps the last three words for emphasis on David’s cheek with all the grace of the inebriated. His voice is low, and rough, and he’s leaning so slowly into David’s space it’s like the dawn, creeping over the horizon. David can feel his breath, warm where it dusts over his lips, Patrick’s thumbs settled over David’s cheekbones. 

David feels his eyes close and a hook behind his stomach lurches with a deep, primordial  _ want _ . He wants Patrick, has wanted Patrick since he created a job and a place for himself in David’s life and never once asked permission. 

But David also has rules — a single rule — that he’s lived his entire life by, and for as many mistakes as he’s made, he’s never broken it before. And it will kill him to start with Patrick. So, because Patrick is high enough he might regret what’s about to happen, and because David can’t be one of Patrick’s regrets, he turns his head and lets Patrick plant a soft kiss to the top of his shoulder. He pats him gently on the back of the head, pulling him in for a hug that breaks his heart. Patrick’s head is lolling on his shoulder half a minute later, his snore deep and heavy as David lays him back onto the mountain of pillows and allows himself the singular indulgence of running a hand through Patrick’s curls.

As soon as he’s positive Patrick’s so asleep he won’t notice, David’s practically sprinting for the door. He’s in the hallway, pulling the warped wood closed behind him when he stops, hand still wrapped around the doorknob, and sighs into the empty hallway.

Every shred of dignity and self-protective instinct he has — and he’s amassed quite the stockpile over the years — is screaming at him to run. Far. Fast. Don’t leave a note, don’t pass go, don’t collect two hundred dollars. He can send Stevie over in a few hours with an excuse and Patrick’s painkiller prescription and by the time Monday rolls around this whole thing will just be one more for the collection of anecdotes between the two of them. 

But he’s been running his entire life. He ran parties, ran drugs, ran away from his problems and into the arms of people who didn’t ever look at him and tell him he was handsome. Who hadn’t approached him with a sincere smile and told him, in as many words “I believe in you and I want to help you.” And if he’s going to do right by the kind of person he’s trying to become, he’s not going to be able to run anymore. God damn it. 

Which is why he’s perched on the back of Patrick’s couch when he wakes up, jiggling both of his legs up and down at the same time, fingertips pressed to his lips. He forces himself to count to thirty from the first time he sees Patrick stir, and he’s only to 25 when Patrick’s sleep-roughened voice calls out, “Morning.”

“It’s 5:00,” is all David can think to say.

“Oh, shit. Really?” Patrick scrubs a hand across his eyes. “Sorry I was out so long. Did I at least ask you if this was real life while I was stoned?” They’d spent almost an entire afternoon watching “David After Dentist” once, looping the thing and cackling while they did inventory.

“No, no, nothing like that,” David says, and his voice sounds too high in his ears. “Just the normal stuff.” He shrugs his shoulders and shifts a little as the back of the couch digs into his hips.

“Normal stuff?”

“Yeah, you know. You told me I was weird, but a  _ good  _ weird, like your knees.” Patrick’s eyes go wide and he shakes his head a little, laughing. “Oh, and then you told me you were hungry about a hundred times, and almost knocked yourself out on the car window.” David’s eyes follow Patrick’s fingers as they travel to the center of his forehead, where there’s the faintest pink mark but, from what David can see, no actual bump. He presses his hands between his thighs and his eyes drift to the ceiling so that he's not still staring at Patrick's stupid, perfect face. 

“Anything else?” Patrick says, and maybe it’s a catch of the light, maybe it’s one question too many and David’s finally at a limit he didn’t know he had, but the voices in his head go eerily quiet, the ringing in his ears louder and sharper as he dissociates long enough to hear himself say:

“Well, you told me I was handsome, and had big hands. And then you tried to kiss me.” He meets Patrick's eye and waits, the world balanced on the head of a pin.

The blood drains from Patrick’s face and the smile that creeps across his face is a deflated, scared thing that David hates. It’s the only time Patrick has ever smiled at him that David has hated it. He lets out a weak laugh and is suddenly shockingly preoccupied with his fingernails. “Oh, wow. I thought I dreamed that one.”

“Nope, definitely happened. Here. In this reality.” David gestures at the apartment around him. He’s not sure why his voice sounds so strained, like he’s ready to snap, but if he doesn’t calm down he’s going to explode into a million tiny anxious Davids all running around and yapping at Patrick. He stands and starts to pace, shaking his hands at the wrist before tucking them around himself. 

“David, I,” Patrick’s voice gets caught in his throat and he coughs and tries again. “I’m sorry I did that. That’s super inappropriate, and I shouldn’t have put you in that position. For what it's worth, I was  _ very _ high on anaesthetic.”

“Yeah, I got that part. It’s just.” He takes a deep breath and forces himself to stop walking. He needs to have this conversation, because that’s the only way to be done having this conversation, and David  _ desperately  _ wants to be at the point where they never have to have it again. He wants to be able to go back to the way things were when this was just a neat little box he could keep closed, because it was just  _ his _ box, and the thought of Patrick being in the same box was so unbelievably foreign as to be impossible. “There was also a bunch of stuff about a date we had? For my birthday?”

“Oh my God,” Patrick looks like he just swallowed a goldfish, and David wants to melt into the floorboards. “David, I can explain. I didn’t – it was a joke. The whole thing, the dinner, I felt so stupid afterwards, for dressing up, and for getting you that gift, I spent weeks making fun of myself, calling it a date in my head and I just. With the drugs and all…”

Patrick trails off, which is fine, because David doesn’t need him to finish. Of course it was bullshit, it was all bullshit, and even if Patrick sounds like he’s still trying to convince himself of something, it doesn’t matter because this is it. The bottom has officially fallen out and it’s not getting any worse from here. Patrick said it himself — it was a joke. All of it. And jokes are foolish, hilarious little things that don’t matter and don’t mean anything and that’s all David is so. This is fine. “You know, you really don’t need to explain. I get it. It’s — it’s just a joke. I get it." He attempts a laugh that dies the second it leaves his lips. "So. If comedy hour is over and you’re officially awake and recovered, I’m just. I'm going to go.”

He counts to three silently, staring at the top of Patrick’s head, where a little cowlick of curls sprung up during his nap. It’s all he can see, because Patrick still isn’t looking at him, staring at his bedspread and sniffing heavily. He literally can’t bring himself to look at David, which is somehow the part that hurts more than all the rest of it. That he’s so embarrassed for David he can’t even bare to look at him with those kind, owlish eyes that somehow  _ always  _ make things better. Even things that have no business being made better. 

When he gets to “one”, he turns and he goes. He doesn’t run, he doesn’t trudge, he keeps his spine straight and his head held high enough that the tears have to fight to well up and over onto his cheeks. It’s a battle they win, but it’s a battle David makes them fight. He should have left. Should have let Patrick nap, and never made him have this conversation. David thought he was enlightened, thought he wanted to live in the certainty of truth rather than a debilitating doubt. But now they’re here, and all he wants to do is rewind by several hours and reinstate his blissful ignorance.

The door behind him is almost closed when he hears it. It’s Patrick’s voice, bent under a strain that plucks at David’s heartstrings. It’s the sound of a thousand broken hearts concentrated down into a single word: “Don’t.” 

He freezes, his heart in his throat and the blood rushing through his ears. His hand is glued to the doorknob and he squeezes his eyes shut until he sees bursts of color behind them. There’s a grunt of pain behind him, and when he turns to look — because he’s still human, and Patrick is still his friend, and he’s never been good at self-preservation — Patrick is on his feet, one hand stretched towards the door and the other pressed to the side of his jaw, his face contorted in pain. “Don’t go.”

David’s heart cracks clean in two, and he steps back into Patrick’s apartment, pulling the door closed behind him. “Sit down before you hurt yourself.”

But for the first time since David folded him gently into the front seat of his own car, Patrick doesn’t listen. He walks towards David, making it as far as the armchair before he sits, elbows on his knees. “Come sit?”

“I’m good here, thanks.”

“David,” his head falls between his shoulder blades, his chin tucked to his chest, and David can’t tell if he’s exhausted, or strung out from the long day, or just not able to look at David when he breaks his heart, but what Patrick says is, “I’m sorry.”

“You said that. Several times, actually.”

“Yeah,” Patrick runs his tongue along his lower teeth, making his lip bulge, wincing just a little. “But not for the right thing.”

“Well for what, then, if not passive sexual harassment?”

“For not telling you that I have feelings for you?” His eyes dart briefly to David’s before they track back to his palm where his thumb is rubbing against a callous. “And for not telling you for long enough that this is how you hand to find out. You deserve better than that, David.”

“Mm, no, see. You can’t just say things like that to me.”

“Things like what?” The corner of Patrick’s mouth perks up and it’s a tiny thing that looks too much like hope. 

“Like...telling me what I deserve, and that you’re sorry, and that — that you have  _ feelings  _ for me!” He says the last word like it’s not all Patrick has for him, and a familiar flame rushes to his cheeks again. He watches Patrick watch him and sees that hopeful smile grow bigger by degrees. “We’re business partners, Patrick, and that — that means the world to me. You said yourself, what happened on my birthday was a mistake, and —” 

“I never said that, David. I would _never_ say that.”

‘Well it’s certainly what I heard.”

“Then stop hearing what you want to hear!” Patrick presses the heels of his hands to his eyes and sighs heavily. “I’m —” 

“Do not say sorry,” David hisses. He’s tempted to click his teeth at Patrick like the volleyball scene out of  _ Top Gun  _ but his brain is still reeling too fast. He sinks to the floor, pulling his knees into his chest and resting his forehead against them. 

“Hey,” Patrick says, and then David feels him on the floor next to him, body pressed up against David’s side, warm and comforting and close enough that David risks getting wrapped back up in his smell and his smile and all the things that make his brain turn to mush. “I’m doing this wrong. Will you just — here.” Patrick turns his body so that he’s facing David and dips his chin until he catches David’s eyes. He smiles, soft and small and anxious, and when David smiles back, a spark flashes deep in his warm brown eyes.

“David, I have royally messed this up. But I am trying to tell you that I like you and I’d like the chance to take you out on a real date. A date we both  _ know  _ is a date. The only thing about your birthday I regret is not telling you how I felt then, and all the time we’ve lost. And I — I get how important Rose Apothecary is to you. So if you can’t, or don’t want to, you can walk out of this room and never look back, and I promise we’ll never talk about it again.”

“I don’t want that,” David’s voice breaks, but when he looks up from his knees, Patrick’s eyes still haven’t left his face. “But I don’t — You can’t like me, Patrick.”

“Why not?”

“Because I’m  _ me _ . I did ecstacy for my fourteenth birthday and you went to play fucking laser tag. You met a stranger and volunteered to help with his business, I  _ literally _ don’t meet people. I’m —” 

“ — a little bit country? A little bit rock and roll? David. We’re people. Different people. But you make it sound like we haven’t worked together for years. Like I don’t know the man I’m sitting here talking to. Trying my hardest to ask out on a date.”

David opens his mouth to respond but Patrick just holds up a hand. “My turn to monologue for a minute. Because none of the things you’ve said were anywhere near the full story. You’re pretending I’ve always had my life together. When we met, I was rebuilding my  _ entire _ life on basically a whim. A terrified whim, for what it's worth. And being willing to help a stranger doesn’t mean much of anything when the stranger has you starting a new career path - a new life - after seven voicemails and a handshake.” 

David sniffs thickly and pulls at the cuffs of his sweater, until Patrick reaches out and takes David’s hand in his. And it’s not the first time that day they’ve been hand in hand, but it’s the softest, and the only one that’s felt connected directly to David’s heart. David takes several shaky breaths before he says, “Did you practice that? Because that was very, very good.”

Patrick laughs and kisses the back of David’s hand, pulling him into Patrick’s side, and it feels so warm, and soft, and familiar, that David lets himself relax. 

“I may have spent some time, after your birthday, thinking about all the things I wished I’d said to you that night.”

“Well, while I have to say I wish you’d saved us the  _ several years  _ of intervening pining — it was pretty great to hear them just now.”

“Yeah.”

“Mmhmm.”

“How great? Like, on a scale of one to Mariah.” Patrick looks down at David from under eyelids still heavy with sleep, and maybe a little bit of the drugs, but he’s watching David’s mouth and there’s a hunger there, too. A million answers fly through David’s head, but the only one he wants — the only one that fits — is to lean into Patrick’s space, his lips so close to Patrick’s they’re touching at an atomic level, breathing in the warmth and scent and softness that is Patrick Brewer, before pressing their lips together softly, melting the line between the past that was and the future that could be. 

And maybe it's not everything their first kiss should be. Patrick is swollen, and probably in pain, and while all David wants to do is suck Patrick's bottom lip between his teeth and bite, he also thinks maybe it's better this way. Easy, and careful, as much like breathing as it is kissing. It's over too fast, Patrick's head falling onto David's chest as he asks about another painkiller, but it's enough.

David Rose isn’t naive. He knows that there will be conversations — long ones, short ones, ones that chip away at the walls they’ve both built and the lies they’ve both told and all the ways they’ve failed to see what’s clearly in front of them both. But he also knows that there are so few moments in life when the world stops spinning, and time stops passing, and all of the sunrises and sunsets and tidal waves come to pause because even they recognize that a beautiful thing is happening. That two people are finding each other again, in this life as they do in every life. That true love’s kiss is chasing down a codeine cocktail and months of missed confessions, running up the path of promise and potential. As Patrick's breath syncs up with his, the only noise in the apartment, David feels the world around them cease to be how it was, and in the next second, start again as something totally new.

**Author's Note:**

> Title from the Richard Siken poem ["Detail of the Woods"](https://poets.org/poem/detail-woods), because every poem by Richard Sicken has a fanfic title buried in it somewhere.


End file.
